Tackle Your Passion Project With The 90-90-1 Rule

The daily grind can quickly overshadow our passion projects; emails and meetings tend to displace things like writing a book or training for a marathon. How can we strike a balance and dedicate time, attention and energy to that one special project that needs our focus? Robin Sharma encourages us to use the 90-90-1 Rule.

For the next 90 days, devote the first 90 minutes of your work day to the one best opportunity in your life. Nothing else. Zero distractions. Just get that project done. Period.

Sharma urges us to not give our peak hours to meaningless work:

Just stop doing any fake work first thing in the morning. Check your email after lunch. Make your phone calls in the afternoon. Surf the Net in the evening.

A study published in the European Journal of Social Psychology concluded that on average, it takes more than two months (66 days, to be exact) before a new behaviour becomes a habit. Sharma’s rule tacks an extra month onto the 66 days, guaranteeing that the habit sticks. Give the best hours of your day to moving forward on something meaningful.

I see and hear this type of advice a lot from productivity gurus: Only check your email once a day, only do certain types of work on certain days, etc. What kinds of work do these people do that no one else depends on them for a timely response? I wish I had that luxury. If I never checked my email until after lunch, I’d end up with some ticked off clients when they emailed me about a time-critical situation.

Sasha

It’s more to help you focus instead of always being in a reactive, flustered state — maybe for you the answer is that you need to check your email more than once a day, so you set aside half an hour in the morning, half an hour after lunch, and one more at the end of the day, so no one is waiting on you for answers, but you’re still able to devote quality, focused time to all of your tasks.

Flyonthewall602

I love this idea, except (and I have noticed this a lot), I have to wake up at 6am to get to my menial job at 8am…Waking up at 430 so that I can spend 90 minutes focused on one thing just doesn’t work. This would be a great idea if I were working from home or didn’t have to be at work until 10am…how can I adapt this for my job which requires me to be in at 8am?

woopin

What do you mean by it “just doesn’t work”? I wake up at 5:15 for my project and it does work.

ladybizness

I totally agree that it works, but people have to be willing to sacrifice sleep in order to be productive. For me its not a sacrifice because its something that I “want” to do. Love your enthusiasm! #LadyBizness #90DayFocus

ladybizness

I have been using this method and adjusting it to my lifestyle. I give 90 minutes during the day. Not necessarily first thing in the morning, But I have gotten up at 4 am and accomplished a lot in that timeframe. It works if you do! #LadyBizness #90DayFocus